The Many Names of God
Review
Emmanuel
In our day there is a cultural and social battle over the meaning of Christmas. The battle has extended from the schoolyard to the courtyard. However, the battle over Christmas has not only impacted schools and public places.
The struggle over the meaning of Christmas has impacted the church. However, the struggle to understand the significance and meaning of Christmas is not a new one. It was a struggle between the writers of the New Testament, as they each approached the Incarnation with their own impressions.
Mark doesn’t mention the birth of Jesus. It is almost
as if Jesus simply appeared on the face of the earth.
Luke’s gospel is where we usually like to spend the holiday season. Luke’s gospel is full of angels, and angelic choirs. Luke speaks of "Peace on earth and good will toward men." Luke pictures, for us, peaceful shepherds from the peaceful fields on a peaceful night visiting the Prince of Peace.
John speaks metaphorically of the birth of Christ. He talks about Jesus being the Word of God. He tells us that Jesus came and set up camp among us and has shown his light to mankind.
Matthew has none of those pictures. There are no angelic choirs, no pronouncements of peace, no saving light. Matthew presents what Fred Craddock calls "the hard side of Christmas." But in a world that is getting increasing smaller and tremendously more urban, its message may be the most relevant to us today.
Matthew establishes two facts.
First: Jesus came from us
Matthew 1:1-6
1 A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham:
2 Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, 3 Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar, Perez the father of Hezron, Hezron the father of Ram, 4 Ram the father of Amminadab, Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon, 5 Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse, 6 and Jesse the father of King David. David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife,
Now, I can understand if your heart was not stirred by these few verses of scripture. I know that genealogical tables are not usually electric with homiletical gems. However, in these verses, most of which do read something like a phone directory, we have the theological stage set for all the rest of Matthew’s gospel.
The first thing we notice is that Matthew is only showing us a select list. He, being not at all concerned about the thoroughness of his genealogical record, leaves gaps of up to several generations in his list. All this makes it even more special that, in the opening paragraph of our cemetery tour, Matthew takes us to four very ancient graves in the oldest sections of Israel’s burial ground.
Later in this chapter Matthew goes on to tell the story of how the virgin Mary became Jesus’ mother - a rather scandalous story. Four women, all included in the genealogy, are what Ray Bakke calls the "grandmothers of Christmas past."
They are part of the Christmas story although moviemakers would give these stories an R rating.
Let’s look specifically at Four Women in Jesus Heritage
Tamar – Genesis 38
(A deceptive foreign woman)
In the midst of the Joseph story, the author flashes back to reveal another side of the miraculous providence in the Joseph story. Tamar married the first two sons of Judah and outlived them both.
She was denied marriage to the third son, thus breaking local Levirite marriage laws, and she was returned to her village. (As the father of two sons, I can understand Judah’s reluctance to have her "devour" all three of his boys!)
Sometime later, she decided to intervene in Judah’s life. She dressed as a prostitute and had a sexual affair with him. He could not pay her, so he left his ancient "credit card" (his signature ring with its cord and his walking stick).
Later Judah heard Tamar was pregnant and ordered she be executed. When asked who the father was, she produced the "credit card," and Judah’s hypocrisy was exposed. Tamar had twins, one of whom is an ancestor of Jesus.
Rahab – Joshua 2:1-24; 6:22-25
(A foreign prostitute who demonstrates faith)
Rahab ran a hotel in Jericho. We gain insight into what type of hotel this was from James 2:25, which uses the word porne to describe Rahab. It was an urban place where lights are low and you don’t use your real name, if anyone asks your name, making it an obvious place for spies to go and hide.
When the Jericho Gestapo entered Rahab’s hotel, she hid the spies, then lied to the police and put them on a false trail. Then she told the spies of her faith in the God of Israel. She heard of the exodus and the miracles. It was obviously her faith that saved her. Nothing else could, right?
Ruth – Ruth
(A foreigner who God ties to His historic purposes)
Ruth’s story begins with a family, Naomi, along with her husband and two sons (whose names mean "weak" and "sickly") migrating to Moab because of a famine in Israel. The two sons marry, but soon Naomi’s husband and the two sons die. When Naomi decides to return to Israel, Ruth refuses to leave her, and returns to hostile territory.
While Ruth is never called a sinner, her culture and family tree come from Sodom. Ruth was a Moabite, the child of Lot. Lot’s daughters, afraid that they would never marry, after the escape from Sodom, got Lot drunk one night and had a sexual affair with him. Moab was one of the children from that affair. Moab was, also, one of the neighbors of Israel that continually oppressed God’s people during the period of the Judges.
Yet, despite her background, there is an Old Testament book named after her. And in the closing words her importance to God’s purposes are felt. "So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. Then he went to her, and the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son … And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David."
Bathsheba – 2 Samuel 11:1-12:25
(A foreigner who in a twisted conspiracy becomes part of God’s plan)
The genealogy doesn’t even give us her name. It simply says that she "had been Uriah’s wife." With Israel’s middle management off at war in modern Amman, Jordan, David was clearly bored. It had been some time since he had written a song, played a harp or killed a giant. So, after playing the "Peeping Tom", he got sexually involved with a beautiful neighbor. This neighbor’s husband happened to be David’s best soldier, Uriah. Sometime later, she sent him word back at the palace: "I’m pregnant."
David initiated a plan to "take care of" this problem. First he wrote to General Joab and ordered him to send Uriah home for some R&R. If Uriah slept with his wife, perhaps he (and others) wouldn’t suspect that the child wasn’t his. But it didn’t work. Uriah, a noble soldier, refused to indulge his own pleasure while his brothers were at war.
Plan two involved a state dinner with lots of drinking. Perhaps under the influence Uriah would go home. But again it didn’t work.
In desperation, David moved to plan three. As commander- in- chief, he directed his field general to fight all the way up to the wall with Uriah at the point, then retreat quickly. This was a risky, even foolish maneuver, because all the enemy needed to do was drop rocks on the heads of those close to the wall, and they were as good as dead. It worked. Uriah never knew.
David married the publicly grieved widow in a state marriage. His "ratings" doubtless went up in the polls. But a prophet exposed David’s sin. The baby died soon after birth. Their second child was Solomon.
Why are these four women in the opening paragraph of Matthew’s "Good News"?
Four sinners?
Jerome in the fourth century suggested that all four women were sinners and that Jesus came into the world to save women like them. The problem with this interpretation is that all the men in the text were also terrible sinners. There must be a further word.
Support Group for Mary?
In a tongue- in-cheek fashion, Raymond Brown offers another idea. Perhaps Matthew provides pastoral care for Mary by bringing together all the scandalous birth stories as a kind of historical support group, because Mary was having a very difficult time explaining where her own baby came from. So "Mary, you are not alone" is the message.
Four Foreigners
Martin Luther was the first who noticed (in print) that all four women were foreigners. Two were Canaanites (Tamar and Rahab), Ruth was Moabite; Bathsheba was presumably Hittite.
Matthew is making an important theological statement about Jesus.
On the human side Jesus was very human. He choreographed into his own earthly body all the most theologically sinful bloodlines in the Middle East. In a very real sense, this opening paragraph smashes racism. Jesus was the mixed- racial Savior of the world. When Jesus died for the sins of the world, all the sins of every racial group in our city are included.
Look down the row to your right. Now look down the row to your left. Look in front of you and behind you. What do you see? These differences in color and feature are the Christmas message from the graveyard.
Jesus came from God
Matthew 1:23 (NIV)
23 “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”—which means, “God with us.”
The Virgin Birth
This birth in this way is as vital to our story today as the resurrection.
Perhaps this is why there are two Christian days which stand above all others. Christmas and Easter.
In any case Matthew establishes the virgin birth and makes it a critical element in the story of Jesus.
Matthew teaches two lessons:
First: Jesus is us
Look at that list of names again.
Jesus comes from a long line of real people. Some are children of Israel and some are children of Ishmael. Some are Godly men and women and some are deceptive and selfish. In other words, this is a list of normal people.
Jesus is us and that connection is important. He understands us. He experienced all of life.
Filled with compassion and love? Jesus was there.
Passionate about life? Jesus was there.
Hungry for knowledge, meaning, and purpose? Jesus was there.
Lonely? Abandoned? Jesus was there.
Tired? Defeated? Jesus was there.
Betrayed? Rejected? Jesus was there.
But there is that critical difference between Jesus and any man…
Second: Jesus is God
He was born of a virgin. We say that so easily. Stop for a minute and think about what that means.
Jesus was born – a human child – because the Spirit of God moved inside the womb of a woman named Mary and made her pregnant without the seed of a man.
Why? What purpose does this serve?
Without the virgin birth there is no Savior. Simply put it is this: Human kind simply cannot produce its own Savior.
We are tempted to seek out other saviors.
We, as a society, have convinced ourselves that we can save our world through a variety of means.
We are told that salvation will come through raised levels of education or economy, through participation in the electorate or the preservation of the environment, through racial, economic, and gender equality or through the efforts of everyone else.
I have one question to pose: Is there any evidence of this being true?
The problem is that we are not any closer to saving ourselves than we have ever been (It seems the more we trust in our own ability to save ourselves, the worse things get.)
Jesus is Emmanuel – God with Us
Matthew extends two promises
First: He was with us then
Matthew 1:23
"Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son and his name shall be called Emmanuel."
Second: He is with us now
Matthew 28:18-20 (NIV)
18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them ina the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age
He is with you now. He is here at your side, as you are spent, as you bow in quiet loneliness, as you feel forgotten and forsaken, "I am with you."
When your home is coming apart, when someone whom you love has a terminal disease or sickness, "I am with you." I am always with you."
This is not the time for us to be tired and defeated. This is not the time for us to surrender our place in the world and to fade into irrelevance.
This is the time
This is time for the Church to move once again with force in the city. It is time we return, and Christmas has given us a message for the city.
This is the time for the church to rise as one and to exalt in the truth. Jesus is here. Jesus is with us now. Jesus is God with us.
